- GoPro Studio is a free piece of software.You saw it earlier when we took a look at assemblinga time-lapse clip.Well, it also gives you the ability to import video clips.One of the challenges with GoPro media out of the camerais that it often has a lot of extra partsthat you don't need.Maybe there were part of the clipsthat you were shooting withthat you decided, well I don't actually need that,this is only the good part that I want to keep,and remember, that highlight-tagging featureon the side of the camera is great for that.other times you might have clips that are perfect,but out of the camera, the mp4 formatdoesn't always work with all video editing tools,particularly older types of video editing toolswhich have a hard time with this newer file format.

Fortunately, GoPro Studio can easily convert the filesinto a standard QuickTime movieor Windows AVI file and make them readily availableto use on other platforms.It also includes the GoPro cineform codecwhich is highly optimized and very compatiblewith just about every professional and nonprofessionalediting tool on the planet.About the only thing you might need to dois install GoPro Studio on those computersso that it has the proper codecthe compressor-decompressor loaded.

All right let's jump into GoPro studio.I already showed you where to get it in the previous movie.And we'll walk you through a coupleof the cool things you can do.Remember there is a full-length course availablehere in the online librarythat will take you into much greater depth.Once you've launched GoPro studioyou'll notice that it offers three steps,the first is view & trim,and in order to do this we need to import some files.In the left-hand column you can click the + symboland it will bring up a file navigation dialog.

Choose your hard-drive and navigate to some footage.Once you open that you'll see a folder filled with content.You may notice that there's lotsof different types of files here.Now, some of those files are greyed outand others are not.You'll see JPEGS for stills,which works if you want to assemblea time-lapse sequence.You'll also see the ability to grab other footagesuch as movies.

Now personally, I recommend navigatingand putting all the stills in a sub-folderbefore you import to make it a bit easierfor the time-lapse movie.Let me quickly do that.I'll press the ESC key, switch to the drive,and let's quickly organize.You'll notice in this case there's a large number of images.Let's scroll to the top,and I have a time-lapse sequence.

I'll make a new folder,call it, _TL1, press Return and then grabthe time-lapse sequence.By moving it into its own folderit's easier to keep organized.All right, let's take those and put them in a sub-folder.All right, let's import.There's that time-lapse folder,and I'll select the first image and choose Open,and it builds a reference movie out of those JPEGS,and imports the image sequence as a time-lapse movie.

Once that finishes I'll also grab a fewstandard video clips.There it is.And let's click the + button again,and I'll sort by kind, navigate down to the mp4 movies,and I can grab all of those.Now chances are, not every clip you shootis going to be useful,but you can bring in all the footage and decidewhich ones you want to work with.It's not looking through some of the related metadata,and bringing in the clips.

If you select only a few clips this processis near instantaneous,but if you grab a couple of days of shootingit may take a few moments to load the footage.You'll now see that all the selected footage is loaded.Let's choose the clip here and take a quick look.When I click on a clip it loads.You'll notice you can also seerelated metadata about the clip,such as its duration as well as the size of the footage.In this case if I press play I can see and hear the clip.

If I want I can mark a new endpointto define the beginning of that clip,and drag a little bit and mark an outpoint,making that clip significantly shorter.You'll notice that you have the name hereas well as the ability to assignwhere you want the footage to go.By default it's going to create a folder called GoPro media,and it will store the converted files there,but you can click change directory if needed.When ready add that clip to the conversion list,and it will queue it up.

You can then go back and proceed to workwith the original clip and look to see if there's more shotswithin that longer clip that you want to keep.For example here,let's grab this part with the diving ascent.I'll click play to preview,and pause and mark an out,and I can add that to the conversion list.

You notice that it automatically enumerates the clipand makes a new one.You can continue to work your way through a longer clip,finding just the parts that you want to keep.Additionally, if you find another clipthat you'd like to review,simply grab that clip and double-click to load it.Let's grab one herefrom our drive to the dive,mark an endpoint and an outpoint,and then add to the conversion list.

You'll notice that if the shot is upside downyou can do things like reverse it,and under advanced settingsyou can even take advantage of convertingthe frame rate or the frame sizeor apply speed up effects.You'll also notice the ability to removethe fisheye distortion.Let's try that here on the time-lapse.Here's the time-lapse clip that we assembled.This is a panning time-lapse shot directly on the GoPro.I'd like to speed that up a little bit,so I'll click advanced settings,I'll assign a new image size such as 1080p for video,and tell the frame rate to be 2398 for my delivery.

Let's speed it up just a little bit.We'll go with a 2x.I can also choose to remove the fisheye distortion.And when I click OK the new clipwill have the distortion removed.Let's add that to the conversion list,and you see that things are now queued up.Now, there's a lot more footage herethat I can work with,but remember this is just a quick overview of GoPro Studio.When you're ready and the clips are loaded for conversion,remember you can select each clip as needed,and if necessary click on advanced settingsto access any conversions.

So if I want that to be 1080pI can click OK and it updates with the new settingsfor the targeted conversion.All right, when you're set you click the convert button,and the files will batch-process.If you don't have enough space you may need to targeta new drive.In this case I'm using an external drive,and I'll make a new folder and call it gopro_mediaand click create.I'll target that destination,and now the conversion is underway.

You can track the status of conversionas you see it's running here.While the conversions are runningyou can still navigate through your loaded clips,and even load a clip and continue to review.This will allow you to pick out additional shotsfrom your footage while the conversionis running in the background.Do keep in mind, if you have a slower computer,trying to view media and convert media at the same timemay drastically slow your computer downor make it unresponsive.Once a conversion is completedit will hand it off to the edit stage.

You'll notice that all these of these clips are processing,and once this first one is doneothers start to queue up.Now if you have a multi-processor computeryou might even notice that multiple clipscan be running at the same time.This is the benefit of modern operating systemsand multi-processor machines.And if I jump over to step 2, edityou're presented with the ability to edit the contenttogether into a timeline.GoPro offers useful templates to choose fromfor premade videos that you just replace your footageinto a template or a blank template,and you can click create.

Now your footage can be selectedand you'll find a variety of effectsin the right-hand panel.This allows you to do things like,select something to white balance onsuch as that sand there or to adjust the content.If I twirl this down you'll notice that the temperatureand tint can be manually adjustedjust to refine a proper white balanceof this underwater shooting.Under the image category I can tweak things likethe saturation and the exposure slightlyto get the best looking shot.

Each of these clips can be independently adjustedgiving you a lot of flexibility.Maybe you want to lift up the exposure a bitto see inside the car and since we brightened it,I'll bring out the saturation a little.If you need to using the framing category,you can also zoom the shot a bitand adjust the panning to frame up the shotto focus on the action that you want.Just be mindful if you go too faryou might start to see black bars.Now this kind of experience allows you to continueto refine your shot as needed,and you'll note that by taking the time to white balanceyou can compensate for different lighting conditionsas well as get the exposure and the contrastthat you deem most useful.

While the eyedropper works well,you might need to tweak just a little bit.This is a tougher shot here because we have underwater,plus the sun and it's creating a lot of differentcolor temperatures and that looks pretty good.You'll also find a variety of presets for simple looks.Now, it's as simple as putting your clips in your timelineand telling a story.Maybe I want to start with this shot first.Well, I can grab those,and simply rearrange,and you see they change order.

When you're all doneyou'll have the ability to exportand you can go ahead and simply chooseeasy presets for things like Vimeo, YouTube,or a high-definition archive.Again, this is just a simple overview of GoPro Studio.Be sure to check out our complete course availablein the online library.

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Released

2/18/2016

Got a GoPro HERO 4 or Session? These tutorials cover the essential skills you'll need to start shooting with your GoPro HERO 4 and HERO Session cameras, whether you capture stills, video, or even time-lapse photography. Author Rich Harrington starts right at the beginning: getting the camera out of the box (trickier than it sounds!) and setting up for your shoot. He'll also share his insights on the different menus and buttons to get you up and running quickly, without fussing over controls. Learn tips for extending battery life, choosing a memory card, and shooting videos, photos, and time-lapse footage. Rich also reviews the GoPro app, for shooting wirelessly with a GoPro, and accessories that make every GoPro owner's experience a little more fruitful and a little more fun.

Make sure to check out other courses in our GoPro training series to explore different creative uses for the GoPro, such as capturing action sports or car-mounted footage.